The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 45 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. In this particular report we briefly touch on three utility patents with the main patent covering "projectors of structured light" used in Face ID. Apple was also granted a design patent relating to the iPhone XR model, and as always, we wrap up this week's granted patent report with our traditional listing of the remaining granted patents that were issued to Apple today.

3D Mapping: Projectors of Structured Light

In August 2018 Patently Apple covered this patent titled "Projectors of structured light" as a patent application that covered 3D mapping (and Face ID) technology. Apple was granted this updated patent today.

Apple's patent FIG. 1 below is a schematic side view of a 3D mapping system; FIG. 2 is a block diagram that schematically illustrates a projection assembly; FIG. 8 is a schematic top view of a semiconductor die on which a patterned emitter array has been formed; and FIG. 11 is a schematic top view of a semiconductor die on which a patterned emitter array has been formed.

Apple's granted patent was for adding an additional 20 patent claims covering Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Laser (VCSEL) diodes and a diffractive optical element (DOE). You could review Apple's granted patent 11,060,851 and its 20 new claims here.

Two Other Granted Patents

Two other granted patents worth noting. The first is titled "Devices with Enhanced Audio" (11,061,643) that we originally covered as a patent application way back in 2013 here. The second granted patent is titled "Capacitive wireless charging systems," (11,061,490) that we covered as Apple's first granted patent back in 2018. The patent figures below are from this patent.

Apple's patent FIG. 1 below is a schematic diagram of an illustrative capacitive wireless charging system; FIG. 2 is a perspective view of an illustrative capacitive wireless charging system having a computer and associated computer stylus; FIG. 4 is a side view of an illustrative computer stylus having one or more wireless power receiving capacitor electrodes.

Design Patent

The one design patent worth noting is patent D924,868 for iPhone XR backplate. Why it took more than three years to get approval for Apple's submitted application is unknown. Apple still lists the XR model as still available.

The Remaining Patents Granted to Apple Today